Wanted: Cute boys and cheap beer

As many of you know, Gaslight is closing it's doors next weekend.  We went this weekend for our last hurrah since next weekend we are out of town for a wedding.  For those of you who do not know, Gaslight is the bar that Brian and I met at in the fall of 2008.  The closing of it's doors has really been bothering me lately, and it has taken a lot of reflection for me to figure out why.  During my quiet 15 minutes of alone time in the shower I realized why...

I moved to Chicago in the fall of 2003.  I was fresh out of college and thought I had the world figured out.  I moved to the big old city from the country - all of my belongings in a little U-Haul and me decked out in my new North Face fleece and Sketchers.  About a month in (maybe even less), I realized - WOW.  I am home sick.  I am not as cool as I thought.  I want to go home.  I loved my roommates, but I was overwhelmed with adulthood and missed my family like crazy.  I was in a dead end "relationship" that constantly hurt my heart, and I felt so alone.  Looking back on it, I muddled through life for a long time here in Chicago.  I went from being happy to sad to miserable to kind of happy and back again.  The only reason I did not come home is because my last day at work in Ohio, a person said that he would see me soon.  I replied that he wouldn't and he said, "You won't make it.  You will come back.  Everyone always comes back."  I wanted to prove him wrong.

My friends Sarah and Becca (and Ann, although she was out of the city by this point!) stuck with me through my very confused times.  Sarah and I started our Saturday football traditions at another bar.   That bar eventually became over crowded and I think changed hands and lost it's OSU ties.  We bar hopped for a while - constantly on the lookout for cute boys and cheap beer.  After one of the bars that we liked lost it's tv connection (true story!), we ended up at Gaslight.  We realized it was a cool place, not very crowded, and had huge mugs of beer for cheap!  We were sold.  We bellied up to the bar every football Saturday for the 2007 football season and into the 2008 season.

2008

First night that Brian and I talked

2009

In the fall of 2008 Brian was our bartender and the rest is history (and detailed in our wedding vows :). The jist of this story is not just the story of us meeting, but who we were when we did.  I was that lost little girl with extreme trust issues looking for cute boys and cheap beer; Pullins was a confident girl looking for cute boys and cheap beer; Brian was a bartender who stayed up way too late and was looking for his place in this big old city too.  Becca was also single and trying to figure out life in her mid-20s.  But, every weekend when we either walked or taxied to the corner of Racine and Montana, we were just three girls and a bartender who were enjoying each other's company in a fun and safe place (with great food, cute boys, and cheap beer!).  The days would turn to nights, and we were still there.  There were times we had breakfast, lunch and dinner and sat in the same seats the entire time!  In the beginning, I would have butterflies when we would arrive.  Would HE be here today?  Will he talk to me?  Is my shirt too tight...did I eat too many mini burgers?  Do I have any spices in my teeth?  And, as the football seasons turned to years and my left ring finger got a little heavier, my feelings changed to...Aahhh.  Feels like home. when I would walk through those big wooden doors.

We used to judge the people who brought their babies to the bar, didn't wear athletic fan shirts, and who had to sit "upstairs" with strollers and high chairs.  This past weekend we sat upstairs around a table with eight or so adults and two babies.  I had spit up all over my gray pants and had half of a beer the ENTIRE game.  I asked for hot water to warm a bottle of breast milk, and I left a great tip because we took up so much space and had so little to drink.

Long story short, the closing of Gaslight is like the closing of my young adulthood.  I have grown, matured, and definitely changed through my years of walking through the wooden doors and I am a better person than I was then because of the people (including the cute boy)  I have met there and bonded with over a cheap beer.  I am sad that it is closing, but at the same time the symbolism is so strong that I am happy to close that part of my life and see what this new bar chapter in my life brings.